


Fix

by Rin_the_Shadow



Series: To Turn Spark [12]
Category: Transformers (Unicron Trilogy), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Armada
Genre: AU to Transformers: Armada, Aftermath of Loss, Alternate Continuity, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Friendship, Gen, Mild Hurt/Comfort, allusions to seeker culture, brief medbay scenes, coping with panic, just that wonderful "precaution" word, like he knows he doesn't need them most of the time, post-Crack (episode), preparing to regroup, red alert loves his scans a little too much, robot-human friendships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-30 01:46:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17214704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rin_the_Shadow/pseuds/Rin_the_Shadow
Summary: In the aftermath of a massive loss, Alexis tries to fix the one thing she knows she can. It won't make everything okay, but if she can get this one thing right, maybe it will make everything...at least less "not okay."





	Fix

She had seen it fall before the others did. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. Rad and Carlos saw it fall, but she had been the first to realize what it was.

She’d run along the ground, following it as Hot Shot and Hoist’s desperate comm.’s rang out over the battlefield. She’d heard just as well as they had what happened.

Rad and Carlos had called after her, but she didn’t seem to hear them. They both knew what it was like when she got into this state. Even without seeing her expression, they knew what was happening.

They found her hunched over the chamois, trying to gather it into a ball. The edges were scorched on one side, and she was already muttering about that. Would it be okay, or should she cut it, or was it better to sew an entirely new piece on in place of the burned ones?

Carlos looked to Rad, at a loss for what to do. Rad had known her for longer, and a lot of times, Carlos felt he handled stuff like this a lot better because of that. “Hey, Alexis?” Rad knelt down next to her. “C’mon, let’s go back to the base.”

Alexis paused for a moment, then continued. “I’ve got to get this right, Rad.”

“I know,” he nodded. “But you can do that back at the base, right? It’s way too dangerous for us to stay out here.”

She faltered for a moment, her hands shaking as she debated what to do. Finally, she grabbed the chamois and bunched it up, pulling it to her and forcing herself to stand up.

Hot Shot found them just then. Thankfully, he didn’t say anything about the fact that they hadn’t stayed where he’d told them to. Rad guessed everyone was shaken up about what happened. Still, he had to believe it wouldn’t be as bad as it seemed now.

“He’s gonna come back, right?” Carlos finally spoke. “I mean, he wouldn’t…”

“I hope so, kid.” Hot Shot’s voice echoed around them.

“He’s got to, right?” Alexis echoed, her voice distant. “I mean, he left this. He can’t just leave it behind even if…”

Oh, no…She’d already imagined the worst-case scenario. Rad had known this would happen with how fast everything had gone south that day. He knew she wanted him to agree with her, whether she believed what she was saying or not, because somewhere in there, he’d become that member of their group. Always the optimist, always supporting you even when you didn’t fully believe it yourself. But this time, he wasn’t sure. If he said it would be okay and then it wasn’t…

When they’d arrived back at the base, Alexis had immediately gone to work, beating the dust out of the chamois and picking out bits of rock and gravel that had gotten stuck in the seams. Sideswipe had started to ask about it, but Scavenger called him off, much to Rad’s relief. Sometimes she just had to work things out this way. He’d seen some of the ‘bots do it, too, and he’d be lying if he said any of the others didn’t have their own things that worked like that. She just got a little more intense about it at times, that was all.

Minutes later, Jetfire had called in. “I’ve got Starscream with me. We’re returning to base.”

Red Alert stood and went to prepare the medbay. Almost at the same time, Alexis stood and ran in the opposite direction, balling up the chamois to keep it from dragging behind her. She didn’t try to go into his room, but stopped just short at the end of the hallway, throwing the chamois down and dropping to her knees.

She worked to spread it flat, occasionally getting up and dragging it when there was a crease in the middle where she couldn’t reach without crawling over it, and then she went to work.

* * *

Meanwhile, in the medbay, Red Alert did a quick once-over of both Jetfire and Starscream. Up until this point, no one had come back with any serious injuries, much to his surprise, but knowing these two, it was entirely possible they would have found a way.

In this case, Starscream had been shot twice, once in the wrist and once in his right wing. He’d been largely unresponsive during Red Alert’s assessment and had only tried to push him away from his wing reflexively, rather than commenting on it.

The medic conceded that yes, he understood it was extremely rude to reach for someone’s wing without permission, and that in most circles, it was considered overstepping to ask about it if they didn’t offer it first. “However, in this case, I need to check to see if it will heal on its own or if it needs—”

“It will,” Starscream answered, the first words he had said since returning. “Jetfire shot to throw off my course, not to ground me. I’ve had the other kind often enough to know the difference. It will heal on its own.” He could not help noticing his tone as he spoke. Completely detached, not even the residual trace of fear he’d shown after Mars. The medic suspected the wounds of this battle were not primarily physical.

Even so, Red Alert didn’t want to have to point out that Starscream tended to be one of the guiltier parties when it came to downplaying or even outright lying about injuries. “Would you let me take a scan to be sure of it? I can dismiss you from the medbay after, and if your scan shows anything concerning, I will have you return.” If he was uncomfortable with his examining them directly, it might be better to start by looking at an image of it.

He’d conceded fairly quickly, which would have been an improvement if not for the behavior Red Alert had noticed earlier. He took the scan and then moved to work on his other patient. He didn’t have to watch to know Starscream didn’t stick around long after.

The images from Jetfire’s scans showed some tearing where he had strained his acceleration systems. That was something that would heal on its own, provided he gave it a day or two to rest, which he had to admit was not very likely for Jetfire even as he explained the need for it. Still, unless he managed to tear something further in that time, there wasn’t a lot Red Alert could do at the moment.

“I could’ve told you that,” the shuttle quipped, his effort sounding forced.

“Yes, you could have, and it would as likely as not have been untrue,” Red Alert responded. “In any event, Optimus is waiting for your report. I won't keep you any longer than necessary.”

Jetfire sighed, “You don’t have to tell me twice.” He stood. “This is…this is going to be an interesting report.”

* * *

“Alexis, you’ve been at it for over ten minutes now.” Rad was starting to worry. In all the time she’d been at it, she’d folded and unfolded the same corner for almost the entirety of it. It was bigger than her, and she couldn’t get it to line up perfectly. That much was understandable.

But by this point, it was obvious she was just upsetting herself even more, rather than calming herself down. There were creases that didn’t need to be there. It worked itself off the line when she added the other side. It just flat-out wouldn’t do what she was trying to get it to.

“I’ve got it this time,” she insisted. Which would be reassuring if she hadn’t claimed that at least three of the past few times she’d done it.

“Okay,” Rad agreed, not sure what else to do at this point. “This time it can just be good enough, right?” _You don’t have to get it perfect_. She continued, but he was certain she’d heard.

Up until that point, Carlos had watched near helplessly. But now he stepped forward and offered, “Hey, Alexis, what if me and Rad helped you get it? It’s like twice your size at least, so if there were more people on it…”

Before she could respond or he could finish, they heard metallic footsteps coming up the hall. Rad felt his stomach drop as the former Decepticon stepped into view, taking in the scene before him.

“Hey, Starscream, hang on, I just need to get this one corner and then…” she started, distress audible even as she schooled her expression.

This was one of the things Rad had worried about when he’d talked to him earlier. Maybe he should’ve explained it better, but he hadn’t known how at the time. Even now, how would he put this into words? _Sometimes she gets really focused on little things when she gets stressed, but hey, that’s kinda like what you do, right?_ Because _that_ would’ve gone over well.

“It’s all right, Alexis. That’s enough.” Starscream spoke evenly, but Rad couldn’t help noticing something was off with his tone. “I lost them—Sonar, Runway, and Jetstorm. So it doesn’t matter anymore. I can’t use it for its intended purpose—”

“Gosh, _stupid_.” Alexis pressed her face into her hands. It wasn’t directed _at_ anyone, but Starscream didn’t necessarily know that. Rad started to explain, _she doesn’t mean you_ , but before he could, she continued. “I just…I didn’t mean it was…That was just an example. I didn’t mean that was the _only_ thing you could use it for. Just that you _like_ the Mini-Cons, and so I thought—but there are other things too. Use it to polish your wing-sword, hang it off something, just hold onto it sometimes, throw it over Swindle if he annoys you—the point was it was something we wanted to make _for you!_ ”

Starscream just stared for a moment, struggling to process her words as Rad mentally prepared himself for the worst. He’d seemed to appreciate it when they’d given it to him, even though he hadn't known how to react. But if he'd assumed it just had the one function... Had he really understood so little of what they’d meant by it?

She continued. “And I just—I know the mission went bad today and I wanted to fix it before giving it back and—”

Beside him, Rad felt Carlos flinch. He’d never done well with reminders of missions going bad or Megatron or anything in that vicinity before, but Alexis was too worked up to stop herself.

But to all their surprise, Starscream knelt down, extending a hand towards Alexis. “It’s all right,” he said quietly. “It’s fine. Hand it to me.”

She stopped, staring like he’d just told her she was actually capable of breathing in space. “B-but…I didn’t finish it.”

“You did well enough,” he replied. “Besides, I’ll just undo your work when I pick it up. I’d hate to waste your efforts.”

He spoke like he understood her position, Rad couldn’t help but notice. Given some of what he’d seen and some of what Alexis had mentioned before, it wouldn’t be that surprising if he’d been there himself. Though, and he hated to think of this, he doubted there had been someone playing the role for him which he now took for her.

Alexis stared for a long moment. Then she sighed once, tension draining from her. She turned and picked up the chamois, shoving it awkwardly over his extended finger. He let her take a moment to push it mostly over his hand, even though everyone could see how tense it made him to stay in this kind of position.

When she had finished, she took a step back, surveying her handiwork for a moment before deciding she was satisfied with it. He stood, bringing his hand up to observe. He still didn’t understand much of this kind of thing, did he? “…Thank you,” he finally managed, still using the words almost experimentally.

Then he headed into his room. The kids watched the door for a moment before turning and heading back up the hallway. It hadn’t really settled things, not by much. The Star Saber and Skyboom Shield Mini-Cons were still in the hands of the Decepticons, and that was at least partly their fault. The Autobots wouldn't blame them, but tensions would still be high. Rad knew that on some level, Alexis understood she couldn’t fix everything just yet. Really, there was next to nothing they could do now.

But he’d also seen what happened between her and Starscream just then. He’d recognized something and responded to it, and one way or another, it had been good for both of them. Had she just needed to hear she'd done well enough from the one she'd intended it for? He didn’t know if he should bring it up or if he should wait to see if she mentioned it. But if all they could do was watch and wait, then whatever they had to do to keep from going crazy in the process was okay with him.

That exchange he’d seen had proven it in his mind: Things would work out in the end.

And he knew he was being overly optimistic. Things were bad and there was no disguising that. But he had to believe things would turn out okay. The Autobots _would_ rescue the Mini-Cons again. He had to believe that.

**Author's Note:**

> So there were actually a lot of little things that happened with this one that I hadn't expected to be put down the way they turned out. The medbay scene existing at all was one of them. But this one was inspired by a mix of a few different fanarts I'd seen floating around, as well as a few ideas I'd had just pop up over the course of writing for the series.
> 
> In any event, please let me know what you think!  
> ~Rin


End file.
